This is ubiquitous surveillance: All of us being watched, all the time, and that data being stored forever. This is what a surveillance state looks like, and it's efficient beyond the wildest dreams of George Orwell. Sure, we can take measures to prevent this. We can limit what we search on Google from our iPhones, and instead use computer web browsers that allow us to delete cookies. We can use an alias on Facebook. We can turn our cell phones off and spend cash. But increasingly, none of it matters. There are simply too many ways to be tracked."

I think Orwell and co always thought that a surveillance state or a totalitarian regime is something "obviously evil", but it's more like "very nice and clean on the surface, and only evil under the hood". For example you can use facebook and google without paying money and you get so much from them, but many people don't get that information is the payment.

anyway I say this as a paranoid man:
1984 is worse than our world _________________"I want to see gamma rays! I want to hear X-rays! Do you see the absurdity of what I am? I can't even express these things properly because I have to conceptualize complex ideas in this stupid limiting spoken language!"

We're getting closer, and doing it rapidly. Political correctness? Constant and overwhelming propaganda and linguistic thought control? Opportunistic populist communitarianism*? Politicians who lie and double-speak more than speak the truth? Constant state of war? Police using military grade weapons? Ubiquitous and intrusive monitoring? Proletarian and elite classes? Elite "inner circle" class of the politically powerful? Torture? Imprisonment and even executions without process of law?

All of that's happening right now, and I don't think anybody can dispute it.

* Communitarianism is the political/moral philosophy that morality cannot be objectively defined by philosophical reasoning or utilitarianism, and morality is whatever the general public thinks is okay. I call it "lemming herd morality", and the leadership philosophy of "leading from behind" is an offshoot of such thinking. It's actually a deception, in that the "herd" doesn't know it's actually being steered by populist demagoguery, propaganda, linguistic manipulation (e.g., doublespeak, labeling, etc.)._________________

patrix_neo wrote:

The human thought: I cannot win.
The ratbrain in me : I can only go forward and that's it.

Last edited by Bones McCracker on Mon Mar 18, 2013 2:45 am; edited 1 time in total

And truth is often stranger than fiction - a thought that is quite scary in the context of 1984._________________Kali Ma
Now it's autumn of the aeons
Dance with your sword
Now it's time for the harvest

We're getting closer, and doing it rapidly. Political correctness? Constant and overwhelming propaganda and linguistic thought control? Opportunistic populist communitarianism*? Politicians who lie and double-speak more than speak the truth? Constant state of war? Police using military grade weapons? Ubiquitous and intrusive monitoring? Proletarian and elite classes? Elite "inner circle" class of the politically powerful? Torture? Imprisonment and even executions without process of law?

All of that's happening right now, and I don't think anybody can dispute it.

* Communitarianism is the political/moral philosophy that morality cannot be objectively defined by philosophical reasoning or utilitarianism, and morality is whatever the general public thinks is okay. I call it "lemming herd morality", and the leadership philosophy of "leading from behind" is an offshoot of such thinking. It's actually a deception, in that the "herd" doesn't know it's actually being steered by populist demagoguery, propaganda, linguistic manipulation (e.g., doublespeak, labeling, etc.).

it's more complex than that. Notice that most of the spying mentioned in the article is by private organizations, with which we have voluntary agreements. My guess is that people just don't care or know what is going on.

I think Orwell and co always thought that a surveillance state or a totalitarian regime is something "obviously evil", but it's more like "very nice and clean on the surface, and only evil under the hood". For example you can use facebook and google without paying money and you get so much from them, but many people don't get that information is the payment.

anyway I say this as a paranoid man:
1984 is worse than our world

1984 is worse than our world because it had had quite a number of years to evolve to the time that is depicted in the book.
The Atomic Wars during the 1950's allowed for "The Party" to gain control and re-assure the people which then satisfied one of the conditions of the book within the book - perpetual war as a means to manage supply & demand to then establish a status-quo to remove the concept of boom,bust, good time, bad time, recession. Without change the concept of "better times" is removed and thus the need to change the governing party is now moot.

The newspeak dictionary was upto the Eleventh issue when the events of 1984 unfolded, 30years, a generation to shape the language, to shape the thoughts of the people.

It is only in the last 10years that the seeds of an orwellian society have really started to sprout: Perpetual war due to "War on Terrorism" and the collapsing nature of the middle-east, language modification by the endemic acceptance of Political correctness to demonize phrases in an attempt to remove them from society (a precursor to words)...

You start having some significant attacks in mainland US/EU resulting in another world war and you will see these seeds bloom into 1984 all under the guise of "in the best interest of the people" and the masses will accept it with open arms to stay protected from a soon to be come faceless/non-existent enemy

He couldn't have envisioned much of the surveillance possibilities. How could he know our government can determine our location in a matter of minutes because of our use of mobile phones or imagine the kinds of "eye in the sky" possibilities that now exist. However, in many ways, we're more spied on than what was depicted in 1984. It doesn't really matter if it's corporations collecting much of the data, if Big Brother can just punch out a quick form letter to demand they systematically turn the data over to the state.

Main differences:

a) degree of socialism in the West hasn't yet reached the level depicted in the book (most things not yet rationed; not yet a 1-party system); socialist health care has not yet progressed to mandatory morning calisthenics (but I tell you it will)

b) government is not yet openly watching us through our "screens"

d) there's the whole idiocracy thing going on with the increasingly idiotic and asinine nature of public culture, to include populist demagoguery, which is even worse than depicted in 1984 because of our ostensibly "democratic" nature

e) we don't yet have widely-attended public executions of enemies of the state (although Waco, Ruby Ridge, and McVeigh's execution might qualify)

f) feminists not working to abolish the orgasm (I think this would be much more distant in the future)_________________

patrix_neo wrote:

The human thought: I cannot win.
The ratbrain in me : I can only go forward and that's it.

Last edited by Bones McCracker on Mon Mar 18, 2013 2:53 pm; edited 1 time in total

He couldn't have envisioned much of the surveillance possibilities. How could he know our government can determine our location in a matter of minutes because of our use of mobile phones or imagine the kinds of "eye in the sky" possibilities that now exist. However, in many ways, we're more spied on than what was depicted in 1984. It doesn't really matter if it's corporations collecting much of the data, if Big Brother can just punch out a quick form letter to demand they systematically turn the data over to the state.

Main differences:

a) degree of socialism in the West hasn't yet reached the level depicted in the book (most things not yet rationed; not yet a 1-party system)

b) government is not yet openly watching us through our "screens"

c) socialist health care has not yet progressed to mandatory morning calisthenics (but I tell you it will)

d) feminists not working to abolish the orgasm

e) we don't yet have widely-attended public executions of enemies of the state

Other similarities not yet mentioned:

Eradication of religion well under way. Ministry of Truth has become a reality, for most intents and purposes. Dumbing down of society through linguistic manipulation, propaganda, and inane media such as cable news and social media echo chambers is well under way (particularly in the U.S., Japan and Russia). Think about it: lolspeak is not too far off from newspeak. I can has awsum doubleplusgood?

All of which are dependent on a perpetual war, something which hasn't quite been reached (resource wars will more than likely instigate it).
d) is a special case in controlling the masses - love the party not each other, which a 1party system highly relies upon to have total control ( and the special place room 101 has in releasing people back into general population to ensure there is a behaviour inline with party expectations - execute and you make martyrs, vanish and people will remember... reform and society molds around it)

Essentially the main difference is time and a catalyst. Highlighting specific differences from an Orwellian universe is only valid if the root cause triggering it is identified.
Look at the reaction for uk/us upon attack (9/11, 7/7). Civil liberties were cut, surveillance ramped up...
its calmed down a bit, but consider what would happen if mainland US or UK was attacked by an agressor who had the capability to maintain such an attack

I don't deny that. I am however pointing out that events in "1984" had 30years plus a significant war to reach the present state.
Besides the specifics in the technology used to watch over the population ( who in 1949 could imagine what we have now), the general application has been blueprinted in "1984"

telescreens, web usage... all just another tool in minilove workers arsenal to spot non-conformers.

Give us a big war, really big war to be used as the justification to strip with impunity what liberties all hold dear and then we will see some fun.
Look at Britain during WW2 for a model. Now add ontop of that todays technology (this isn't about weapons fighting a front, but on domestic soil...). Now find a reason to not relinquish the control - perpetual war.

over 10years this so called war on terror has been around with a few domestic attacks keeping the thought in teh heads of the nationals that there is a threat... mmm where have I read about sporadic attacks or patsies being dragged to the dock on national television

a) degree of socialism in the West hasn't yet reached the level depicted in the book (most things not yet rationed; not yet a 1-party system); socialist health care has not yet progressed to mandatory morning calisthenics (but I tell you it will)

it is irrelevant if we have 1-party system or n-parties system, in the end the party in charge makes decisions good for the string pullers behind.

the main difference is that all this totality comes slowly and beyond perception of the majority. the main tactics of this regime is stealth._________________--_o_--

Of course they don't, how else could one explain an Obama victory with the current state of the economy and continued encroachment of personal freedoms._________________The further a society drifts from truth, the more it will hate those who speak it.
George Orwell

Of course they don't, how else could one explain an Obama victory with the current state of the economy and continued encroachment of personal freedoms.

The best explanation is that romney is no better.

predictably, y'all americans seem to be saying big govt is the problem, yet the article clearly mentions that private entities are the problem. I personally think both are. I do, however, have a gmail account, gentoo account etc. Perhaps we best accept that these communications aren't secure.

a) degree of socialism in the West hasn't yet reached the level depicted in the book (most things not yet rationed; not yet a 1-party system); socialist health care has not yet progressed to mandatory morning calisthenics (but I tell you it will)

it is irrelevant if we have 1-party system or n-parties system, in the end the party in charge makes decisions good for the string pullers behind.

the main difference is that all this totality comes slowly and beyond perception of the majority. the main tactics of this regime is stealth.

++
the current scheme is actually more devious then the orwellian scheme, because most people don't notice it.

He couldn't have envisioned much of the surveillance possibilities. How could he know our government can determine our location in a matter of minutes because of our use of mobile phones or imagine the kinds of "eye in the sky" possibilities that now exist. However, in many ways, we're more spied on than what was depicted in 1984. It doesn't really matter if it's corporations collecting much of the data, if Big Brother can just punch out a quick form letter to demand they systematically turn the data over to the state.

Main differences:

a) degree of socialism in the West hasn't yet reached the level depicted in the book (most things not yet rationed; not yet a 1-party system); socialist health care has not yet progressed to mandatory morning calisthenics (but I tell you it will)

b) government is not yet openly watching us through our "screens"

d) there's the whole idiocracy thing going on with the increasingly idiotic and asinine nature of public culture, to include populist demagoguery, which is even worse than depicted in 1984 because of our ostensibly "democratic" nature

e) we don't yet have widely-attended public executions of enemies of the state (although Waco, Ruby Ridge, and McVeigh's execution might qualify)

f) feminists not working to abolish the orgasm (I think this would be much more distant in the future)

there are feminists promoting clitoridectomy. A fun subject to read about while sitting in front of a nice fire in your cabinet, enjoying a good cognac._________________Study finds stunning lack of racial, gender, and economic diversity among middle-class white males